They are advocating the abolition of property taxes in Pennsylvania, and replacing the revenue by hiking the state’s sales tax by a measly 1%.

As he put it, the tax burden would be spread out more fairly, and even to folks who visit and spend in our state.

On Thursday, April 5 (2012),HB 1776 was officially introduced in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives by Representative Jim Cox with 60 co-sponsors that include 43 Republicans and 17 Democrats. On Friday, April 13, SB 1400 was introduced in the Pennsylvania Senate by Seantor David Argall with 13 co-sponsors that include 8 Republicans and 5 Democrats. This demonstrates strong bipartisan acceptance of the plan - a very good indication of broad support - and something that we’ve never before seen for this legislation. The list of co-sponsors is listed on this page below my signature and will be updated as more co-sponsors join.

Sounds like a plan.

While working in Wilkes-Barre’s Heights section earlier today, I got to eyeballing both mine and Wifey’s former stomping grounds. She grew up on the next street over---Fulton Street. I spent the majority of my teen years in Interfaith Heights, some 100 yards away from my job site. Wifey’s best friend resided in the house next to where I was toiling away today. Up the block a ways is the former Felt’s store.

Being that my mother once made me traipse back and forth to the old Louden Hill on Market Street for staples seemingly every other day, I once knew every inch of not only the street where I was working, but all of the parallel streets. And with only a few exceptions, these streets were once lined on both sides by modest but well-kept, well-maintained and well-manicured properties.

Today, not so much. Today, the broken-window theory was in full view for me to see in every which direction, despite a lack of broken window panes. And I have to admit, it’s kind of heartbreaking when one considers what once was versus what now is.

And I’m not talking about obvious code violations or anything the City Hall folks could come and tamp down. It’s not any big things that clearly suggest reverse-gentrification has arrived in force. Rather, it’s just a bunch of little things that suggest that nobody cares about the neighborhood anymore. Not the shell-shocked, hunkered-down longtime residents, not the out-of-town landlords, not the slumlords and not the renters themselves.

The weeds popping out of the curb line. The overgrown tree lawns. The towels displayed where curtains ought to be. The dogs running loose. The missing or fallen downspouts. The recycling and garbage cans in front of the homes, or on the front porches. A van with three flat tires. A smashed beer bottle on the sidewalk. A downed tree limb. The abundance of litter. The matted leaves. Cumulatively, it speaks to us by telling us that nobody on that street gives a damn. Oddly enough, while I do give a damn, I do not reside on that street or in that neighborhood.

So what can be done about it?

Should we cuss Hizzoner behind his back? Should we attend a city council meeting and make a scene for the WBRE cameras? Should we outright demand tougher ordinances and resulting fines for the lazy, the slovenly, the apathetic and the landlords who long ago hit the out-migration highway?

Personally, I think we need to implement some sort of program inviting residents to adopt and keep clean their own streets. Call it the “Clean Streets” initiative. Not a yearly, highly-publicized cleanup campaign. I’m talking about an ongoing effort completely supported by the city by way of limited manpower, limited equipment, supplies and ultimately, rewards for the volunteers.

The way I see it, it doesn’t take a busload of folks to keep a single street looking neat and clean year-round. A few motivated people could make a noticeable difference. One question for me is, why isn’t something of this nature already in place? And another would be, why do we even need incentive-laced programs to make people take pride in their own homes, rented or otherwise? And lastly, how come nobody gives a damn anymore?

Rather than haranguing our elected and appointed officials about the sagging conditions in our neighborhoods, perhaps we should be doing a bit more soul-searching coupled with some overdue introspection.

Such as, what am I doing to improve the appearance of my street? Or, how come I don't give a damn anymore?

Long before Gort jumped into the electronic fray, I did so. And the ensuing onslaught of electronically-generated anonymous hate email overflowed my inbox on a regular basis. This stuff was as vicious as it was banal.

At some point, being tired of it all, I mistakenly invited some of these phony brave to tell me I was (insert insult here) in person. As in, far, far from the preying eyes of the police where I could make like a thug on them.

Guess what? No takers. Not even one.

The thing was, because of the incendiary Internet back-and-forth, there were those who thought I was an out-of-control madman with a trail of aggravated assaults behind me. While that may have been somewhat true in a professional sense while at the former job during a previous life, fact is, I ain’t never been arrested for anything.

So, one day I received a prompt to call one of these Internet upstarts, this new guy going by the name of Gort. And being true to who I really am, I told him to snag a twelve-pack and head on over. And much unlike the legions of phony brave who failed before him, he snagged some of those aforementioned agricultural amusement aides and came on over.

Now, when you meet someone for the very first time, conventional wisdom says you avoid subjects such as sex, sports, religion and politics. But, as you must have clearly discerned by now, Gort and I are about as conventional as a coal-fired, Greenpeace-flagged sea-going vessel.

And I must say, while we were obviously diametrically opposed in so many ways, we were able, as he once penned it, to “disagree without being disagreeable.” Well, that is, until he admitted to being a devoted fan of the Philthydumpia Eagles. Too green for my blue tastes. Lucky for him that my brother wasn't on hand that night.

While I consider Gort to be a friend to this day, he is what you might call an Internet friend, meaning I might actually be in his company once a year. Maybe. And despite the many anonymously-driven slings and arrows over the years, what we’ve both gotten out of opining away on the Internet are new friendships that are probably too many to count.

Much of what you see on local blogs today was done first on one of our sites. Be they embedded videos, podcasts, polls, forum pages, home-made videos, on-line radio, photo-shopped pics of a local flavor or calls for face-to-face meet-ups, we were, in my spinning vortex of a mind---co-trailblazers. So, while he may call me the local blogfather, I view him as my co-conspirator who was and still is quite taken with the dark political side.

Knowing the hefty malinvestment one must make to do what Gort has done for seven-plus years, he deserves any and all accolades that may find their way to him.

And Gort, thanks for giving the locals someone else’s ankles to bite at from the deepest, darkest cesspools of Anonymityville.

If you’re able-bodied, can drive a stick and are willing to work long hours when the business climate demands, my office is going to hire a technician or two here in the local market. A classified ad will be appearing very soon.

The compensation levels, the benefits and the chances for advancement are all excellent, just not as good as what secret service agents enjoy.

Tell them I sent you and you’ll likely get tossed out on your ass.

Having a difficult time feeding yourself without the Fedrule Govmint’s help?

Once every hour during the daytime hours, WILK News/Talk/Facebook features the Bloomberg Market Minute, a one-minute rundown of stocks, commodities prices, the latest economic data and what have you. But I’m not sure as to why.

One day it’s a bear market. Next day the market is bullish. Then the next it’s a bear thing again, quickly gone piggish but sure to be bear all over again. Is it just me?

The price of crude oil surges. Then it slips a tad. It spikes again. Then it drops. But, due to unrest somewhere over there where the sun rises at the wrong time, it’s back up. Then it’s down. And up again. Is it me?

Then we have the economic “recovery” data. Unemployment claims are down one month, up the next, down again and then back up the next. Home starts…up they go, and then back down they slide. It’s me, right?

I dunno. Do we really need hourly updates on any of this volatility on parade?

NFL draft tonight.

Only four months to go and it‘s Nirvana all over again.

Concussions? Bounties on players? C’mon, man! What good is playing tackle football iffin’ their gonna make the delivery of a kill shot and the subsequent adrenaline rush illegal?

Let’s keep this a man’s game. Drop a couple of black beauties, put on some wailing heavy metal, work yourself into a frightening frenzy and then get on out their and hit somebody!!! My eyes are rolling back just thinking about it.

In a fast-devolving world where men are repeatedly brow-beaten towards becoming effeminate, it might as well be soccer.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

I was in the door just as soon as it was permissible and back out by 7:08 AM. The ease of use alone makes one wonder why more people don't bother to do their civic duty.

I always arrive when the bell's of St. Luke's strike seven, and there is usually a slew of assorted party apparatchicks handing out campaign literature. This morning, only one stalwart was on hand...the GOP's Alex Partika.

About a week or so ago, the following request from a party honcho arrived via snail mail:

On Primary Election Day, I am asking you to write yourself in under Member of the Republican County Committee for Wilkes-Barre City, Ward 5.

As the letter instructed me to do, I was supposed to ask friends and neighbors from my precinct to also write my name in. Problem is, I am adrift in a sea of Democrats. Blindly loyal, hard-core Democrats.

So, after talking to said honcho and agreeing to get involved, I requested a listing of local Republicans I could approach. And I planned to speak with them this past weekend. Of course, that was before news of my mother-in-law's passing came to the fore.

So, when I was leaving the polls this morning, I asked Mr. Partika to distribute to loyal Republicans known to him the "write in" cards I was provided with. In effect, I figure that makes him my campaign manager. Er, some such thing.

Anyway, even though my planned-on last minute campaign blitz never came about, I did what I could to officially get myself involved in a one-party county known for corruption, a place where the elected as well as the appointed have been going down in disgrace.

Both Wilkes-Barre and Luzerne County desperately need a much more vibrant opposition party. And maybe, just maybe, I'll be seeing what I can offer to all of that other than moving any and all official Republican business to the Hardware Bar.

Monday, April 23, 2012

The EPA’s new rules don’t cover most of those issues. Instead, they address a single problem with natural gas: air pollution.

“These rules do not resolve chronic water, public health and other problems associated with fracking and natural gas,” Schlenker-Goodrich said.

The agency is actually barred from regulating the impact of fracking on groundwater because, in 2005, Congress exempted fracking from the Safe Water Drinking Act. Congressional proposals to give the EPA more oversight have so far failed.

Somehow, it was a very long day today. At least, it feels that way. Dank, dark, dreary and sad.

As of this moment, I am whipped. I am beat. I think I could go outside, lie on the tarmac in the rain and fall fast asleep.

And when compared to the day-in, day-out physicality of my job, a funeral pales. Those of you who know me know that my motto is "Work hard. Play harder." And here I am fatigued after a few hours of mulling around and hugging people.

No talk radio today. No newspaper. And up 'til now, no Internet either. Perhaps that's why I'm feeling so drained, because I am informationally compromised. I dunno. Probably not.

I did catch the fact that our wildly ineffective elected representatives in Washington D.C. are looking to put a major hurt on former major league pitcher, Roger Clemens.

Imagine that. Congress can lie to us, but we dare not lie to them. Pure bullspit, through and through. He should revoke his citizenship and tell the lot of them to go straight to Afghanistan. Hell, if Congress were to ship off to a forward fire base tonight, I'd consider joining the Taliban. Well, assuming the grub and the benefits are good.

Election day tommorrow. Thank Allah. After this one more day, I will not have to listen to Matt Cartright whining like a little girlie on WILK anymore. Ooh, Tim Holden was mean to me. He said this and that. He's a big meanie.

Barf-o-rama!

After that week-long whine of his, I'm pulling for the outsider from Erie or Pittsburgh or wherever they found that mean guy. Yep, I'm pulling for the big, bad meanie from somewhere over there.

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Way back in 2001, some guy unknown to me asked via email what I thought about damming a polluted river.

I’m paraphrasing myself (weird?), but I said something along the lines of “Well, I ain’t no freakin’ tree-hugger, but it sounds kind of stupid to erect a rubber dam in the path of flowing raw sewage.” Something like that.

Contained within my response is my steadfast belief that the laundry list of the most vexing of our problems can be solved by applying a healthy dose of simplicity to them. In case you missed it, I like simplicity.

Should we dam raw sewage and then recreate on, in and around nauseating fecal blooms?

Why, that’s simple. That’s a resounding Not!!!

So, with the Battle for the Susquehanna neatly tucked into the rear view mirror, here we are again, all these years later debating yet another water quality issue. And again, simplicity works for me.

Should we be injecting millions upon millions of gallons of carcinogen-laced water into our soil?

Why, that’s simple. That’s a resounding Not!!!

Yet, amazing as it is to me, here we are doing such a thing on a 24/7 basis. While we are spending millions of dollars to right the environmental wrongs that were perpetrated upon our neighborhoods, our river and it’s tributaries during the century-long anthracite boom, here we are putting our natural resources and our future at risk all over again while in head-long pursuit of the almighty dollar. Obviously, we did not learn the readily-apparent lessons of our industrial past as we are now gleefully repeating it.

No, I haven’t flipped on you. I have not become a card-carrying tree-hugger ready to sacrifice myself to protect endangered snails sporting really cool stripes. The fauna and flora are wonderful and all, but people still need jobs. I get it. I’m not ready to join Greenpeace and invite a bullet from a Russian soldier.

But, with regards to all things hydro fracturing and the like, I remain doggedly stuck on simplicity. Does it make any sense at all to rush into the harvesting of buried energies while the questionable process is still clouded in regulatory secrecy?

Sorry, but it doesn’t require a degree from Harvard to come to the simplest of conclusions…that if it was entirely safe and environmentally-friendly, it’d be completely above board for all to see. It’s simple.

Back in 2004, I wanted my then 3-year-old grandson to join said email friend and myself for a day of paddling on the Susquehanna River. And the first thing his mother--my daughter---espoused were her fears that Gage Andrew might come in contact with the polluted waters of the Susquehanna. This was repeated later when my nephew and then yet another grandson were penciled in for kayaking trips.

And keeping with the simpleton bit, we need to ask ourselves why we are so comfortable with, so resigned to the fact that our local watery playground is too polluted to play in.

In my spinning inner place, I think it doesn’t have to be that way---polluted. And the only way it’ll ever be restored to it’s pristine state back when Chief Muckamucka was making weapons and jewelry and pottery of stone is by demanding better for it and by demanding better for ourselves.

A free-flowing river can and will regenerate itself provided that the folks who could and would draw subsistence and enjoyment from it demand that it be protected no matter what. No…matter…what!

It’s simple. And I like simplicity. It ain't rocket science. And this comes from the long lost son of a certified rocket scientist.

That’s all of it. That’s what I’ve gleaned from the crowded mind of the happenstance Energizer Kayaker. That’s my big Earth Day circumlocution. Now, being that the garbage bags are so ungodly expensive in this city, I'm off to pitch my garbage down the bank.

And if anybody is stupid enough to dare suggest that I’m all in with the limp-wristed, give-peace-a-chance tree-huggers, I’ll have to take an interest in making them plead for mercy.

As far as I can recall, Natalie was the first female that did not shower me with unconditional love. The explanation follows.

Immediately following the protracted kidnapping nightmare--the 16 months I spent on the lam with a “custodian” my father had entrusted me with---I was a protected, coddled, cuddled and celebrated rock star within my familial borders. So much so, that many years later it became patently obvious to me that residual resentment coming from within those familial borders had manifested itself in many ways and hurt my mother, but not me.

Still though, I was that long-ago rescued toddler in so many minds, I could come this close to choking the life out of my cousin Renee’s body in front of St. John’s church and still have my incendiary temper be explained away as some sort of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Trust me, if you’ve never been kidnapped and taken away over state lines, being kidnapped and later being reunited with your family does have it’s embedded perks. Been there, done that.

I suspect that heredity has made me into a lunatic of sorts. Only, my brand of lunacy differs from my father’s being that, thanks completely to his impromptu actions, I was influenced by a cavalcade of folks who should have never influenced me in the first place. Namely, I am a mish-mash of jumbled, often conflicting influences.

Anyway, one fine summer afternoon, I found myself at Natalie’s house, just a stone’s throw away from Coal Street Park during it’s previous heyday. To this day, she still possesses the high-water mark for utter rudeness. The gold medal. In retrospect, I realize she was only doing what good mothers did back in the day, they sought to protect their daughters from boys that came sniffing around. These days, far too many mothers have no idea who their daughters are dealing drugs with.

As the days turned into months, I did absolutely nothing to bolster my case for being accepted as the first-ever son-in-law, although, in my defense, many of the distasteful transgressions on my part were coincidental, if not downright accidental.

For instance, after years of bopping around town in hand-me-downs, I was hired at and I thrived at Percy A. Brown & Co.: Foods of Distinction. In other pedestrian words probably foreign to most people today, I had a weekly paycheck. And as such, I had new clothes, new sneaks and a slew of new sports accoutrements. But I was spending untold hours with many new coworkers who were much older than me.

So, one day, when I was all of 15-years-old, Natalie and I ran smack dab into each other on North Sherman Street, she reacted very noticeably and very badly to the giant stogie that was protruding from my mouth. I did it, Wifey paid for it.

And then there was Christmas. Ah, Christmas.

I was quite taken by the entire glam-rock thing at the time and thanks to my usual play list, so was Wifey. So for Christmas, I bought her a copy of Alice Cooper’s “School’s Out” on vinyl.

At the time, Cooper’s albums always had some novelty about them. As for School’s Out, as fate would have it, the vinyl record had a pair of edible paper panties stretched out over it. I did it, Wifey paid for it.

Oh, and then there was Thanksgiving 1979, when I completely flipped out and beat the very last snot out of my brother-in-law right before we were to partake of Natalie’s hours-long cook fest.

This obvious transgression on my part was beyond reprehensible. The short walk from Coal Street Park to Fulton Street took on the feel of the Batten Death March. This was the nadir of my existence as a son-in-law, or so I thought.

When the circling clouds of dust cleared, my usual, knee-jerk excess was quickly brushed aside because of the recent appearance of Natalie’s first-ever, 3-month-old grandchild…Peace Rebecca Cour. Lo and behold, I did it, and Wifey didn’t have to pay for it.

And therein, at least for me, was the acceptance, the admittance or whatever you might call it, that while Natalie knew deep-down that I was a seriously flawed character, I was a seriously flawed character that not only loved and cared for Wifey, but loved and cared for that little bundle of newfound joy named Peace.

Despite the many and obvious shortcomings of mine, Natalie knew. Natalie knew she had at least one daughter who had far grown beyond her control. But more importantly, she knew she had a daughter who she no longer had to fend for or worry about. And from what I have discerned, there is no greater feeling of relief than that moment when you realize that your somewhat grown child is on the right path to a good life.

Anyway, that’s what I’m claiming from this most unfortunate of passings. I’m saying that Natalie knew Wifey would be okay in the long run.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

I just turned this thingamabob back on so as to escape to the relative safety of fantasy baseball.

Say what you will about that, but it's fraught with far less danger than seeking out any fantasies in Columbian hotel rooms.

Anywho, the following comment from a reader was waiting for me in the moderation bin...

I've been reading your blog for a long time and glad to see that you show that Obama is a dog eating ni**er. Probably eats rats to.

Join us at Stormfront http://www.stormfront.org/forum/ on 'Dog on roof' crowd takes egg to face

The N-Bomb was edited by me, Markie.

My first point was that eating a dog is a tad worse than making a dog take up a seat on the roof of the family station wagon. Secondly, I hoped it would make the folks desperately trying to deflect from Oblahblah's atrocious record give it up with the 'dog on roof' foolishness already.

I will not now, nor will I ever join anyone at Stormfront, or anywhere else where the feeble-minded go to revel in their shared hatred--their foolish rules of ancient date.

Faux superiority borne of stereotype, fear and division is a match that I hope never finds any societal accelerants. And if I may, civility is the lubricant of society.

N-Bombs! I ask for some mild feedback and instead I get idiocy in strong doses.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

TheDaily Callernoted that in President Obama’s best-selling memoir, “Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance,” the president recalls being fed dog meat as a young boy in Indonesia with his stepfather, Lolo Soetoro.

“With Lolo, I learned how to eat small green chill peppers raw with dinner (plenty of rice), and, away from the dinner table, I was introduced to dog meat (tough), snake meat (tougher), and roasted grasshopper (crunchy),” the president wrote. “Like many Indonesians, Lolo followed a brand of Islam that could make room for the remnants of more ancient animist and Hindu faiths. He explained that a man took on the powers of whatever he ate: One day soon, he promised, he would bring home a piece of tiger meat for us to share.”

After his mother married Soetoro, Obama lived in Indonesia from 1967 until 1971, from roughly the age of 6 through 10.

Excerpt: Under a new law, doctors in Pennsylvania can access information about chemicals used in natural gas extraction—but they won't be able to share it with their patients. A provision buried in a law passed last month is drawing scrutiny from the public health and environmental community, who argue that it will "gag" doctors who want to raise concerns related to oil and gas extraction with the people they treat and the general public.

Restrepo is a feature-length documentary that chronicles the one-year deployment of a platoon of U.S. soldiers at one of the most dangerous outposts in Afghanistan--a remote 15-man outpost in the Korengal Valley, named “Restrepo” after a platoon medic who was killed in action. This is an entirely experiential film. There are no interviews with generals or diplomats. The only goal is to make viewers feel as if they have just been through a 94-minute deployment.

Easy. If your structural members such as the header board, sill plate, floor joists and the subflooring are exposed and visible, you look for mud tubing.

Temites will not expose themselves to the elements and travel through mud tubes they construct out of soil and mositure. They will travel over what they cannot not eat, and over cellulose elements not up to their moisture preferences.

If your perimeter structural elements are not exposed, good luck with that.

I was working on Diamond Avenue in Hazleton today. Way down on the outskirts of town in the shadow of the surface-mining mountains. I arrived on scene just before 8 AM, and I found my way back to Wilkes-Barre a little after 4 PM. Upon my return to Wilkes-Barre, it was nice to hear the English language being spoken again.

Anyway, at a quarter to ten, this state police helicopter starts circling the neighborhood. And as it circled slower, it got lower and lower. I figured they were looking for somebody that had run afoul of the law. And then it circles one more time and comes to a hover with the pilots looking down at me. So I waved to them.

Only seconds later, a state trooper came stomping on down the side of the house I was working at. And just as soon as he laid eyes on me, he blurted something into his radio as both he and the chopper headed down the street quite a ways.

And then it hit me. Those guys in the chopper were eyeballing me. I figure I must have matched a description of some creep.

Turns out, the description was as follows: approximately 6 feet tall, thin build and brown hair. Yikes! A little too close for comfort. Although, it said nothing about a half-inch hammer drill.

Interestingly enough, the bank robber was said to be wearing a surgical mask when he knocked off the PNC branch. A surgical mask just like the few I have in my truck's cab.

I have followed your website for a year or so and since you mentioned my name I thought I should introduce myself and ask for your help. I am a 66 y.o. retired medical physician living in Freeburg, PA. I fish the Susquehanna, it's tribs and local lakes 3-4 days a week most seasons of the year. I find your humor, common sense and honesty refreshing and like you, I love the Susquehanna.

In my opinion, the failure of smallmouth spawns, the intersexing of male bass, their infections and death from opportunistic infections and now the appearance of black spots that look all too much like the skin cancer melanoma is all being caused by chemical endocrine disruptors and the chemical pollution of the watershed. The area where I am catching the most involved fish is just downstream from a power plant that for years was dumping frackwater into the Susquehanna. Far too little science has been done by any Pennsylvania agency to address the chemical pollution that is damaging this river and deal with the human public health catastrophe that is likely to come.

I have attached pictures of exotic fish used in melanoma research as well as the smallmouth I have been catching. The similar appearance of the lesions is striking to me as a physician. We clearly need to know what is causing these lesions but if they are melanomas then the public might see a link between their health and the health of the river. UV-B light and chemicals that sensitize the skin cells appear to be the 2 of the causes of melanoma in both the fish and humans. If this is cancer in the fish it may help drive public opinion about what is happening in the watershed.

I have written the attached letter to members of the PFBC, the director of the DEP and the governors office. I am trying to get fishermen on a number of fishing websites which I frequent to do the same. Knowing if the black lesions are melanomas could help move people to demanding an explanation of their appearance and their cause.

Thanks for any assistance that you or other "bloggers" that you know can give in getting people to demand an investigation of this problem.

Excerpt: When I was a boy in the 1960s in the Pittston “Junction,” where the Lackawanna River joins the Susquehanna, pollution had reached historic levels, the result of a century of coal mining and industrial dumping. Like a bad dream, I can still picture the multicolored industrial waste, the orange and purple slicks of chemicals, sitting like a poisonous soup around dead trees in the lifeless, backwater “flats” of the Susquehanna.

I find it spot-on that the author made reference to our elevated cancer rates.

When for-profit companies are allowed to hide the amount and the mix of lethal chemicals they are pumping and dumping as part of their so-called "proprietary" rights, what can only await us and ours is an insidious and totally preventable creeping death.

And remember, for a living, I responsibly and legally apply chemicals.

Eli Manning will host Saturday Night Live on May 5, making him only the third NFL quarterback to ever do so after Tom Brady and big brother Peyton Manning.

After receiving a vulgarity-laced comment not suitable for publication, yes, let’s go there.

Being that Mayor Tom Leighton’s recent proposal to lease the city’s many parking amenities provides me with far more questions than answers, I decided to impersonate an adult by stifling the urge to speculate. And from what I’ve been reading, apparently many others should try making with the adult bit. Believe me, it doesn’t hurt at all.

And to really seal the deal, to give many the mistaken impression that I am in fact a card-carrying grownup, I didn’t even lash out against something I do not completely understand just yet. How ‘bout that?

As far as the lynch mobs getting after J.J. Murphy over his consultancy fees is concerned, I offer the following.

I know J.J. Murphy. And if you were to find yourself in a room with J.J., trust me, that would make you the second-smartest person in said room.

Now, despite what the Republicans posing as selfless reformers in this city would have you believe, he is passionate about Wilkes-Barre and the surrounding environs. He wants what you and I want; to see his adopted city flourish. In a nutshell, he is not the evil incarnate some would make him out to be.

If those comments of mine infuriate you, well, then fire off some more incendiary filth from the relative safety of Anonymity Ville.

As to the county manager’s decision to discorporate Luzerne County from the Hotel Sterling fiasco, I could not be happier.

Sure, that seems to indicate that any impending demolition of the failing structure would fall to The City of Wilkes-Barre to finance. And I’m not entirely sure as of this scribbling how the estimated $1 million in funding could be culled together.

But if the funding could be cobbled together and the building were to be shipped off to the landfill, the city would do what was necessary to take ownership of the property.

Coupled with the new riverfront amenities as well as the soon-to-unfold River Street streetscape project, methinks the marketability of that property soars to a new and dizzying apogee.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. I realize you’re beyond blinded by the overwhelming negativity that is a birthright in this area. Nothing will work. Everything will fail. We can’t do it. Nobody loves us. Boo-effing-hoo.

They told us the theater would fail. It’s booming during a sugar-coated economic depression.

They told us the newly configured skating facility at Coal Street was a waste of resources. The parking lot is full each and every day.

They told us an Arena was not workable in these here demented parts. Still, it attracts world-class entertainment each and every month.

They once told us that our downtown Boscov’s should be bulldozed and replaced by boutique shops. Boscov’s recently reported a sales increase of 16% during said economic depression.

I know. I know. Nothing will work. Everything will fail. We can’t do it. Nobody loves us. Boo-effing-hoo.

But what I’m selling is, if the City can fund the demolition, and if the City can claim ownership of the site coupled with the existing and coming improvements but a few yards removed, then we’re going to see a new downtown pearl rise from the ashes of the former pearl that was The Hotel Sterling.

Uh, you ran for the office, didn't you? You saw yourself as the high-and-mighty, unaccountable czar-master, right? I can do whatever I wish; laws, states rights, decorum and the Constitution be damned, correct?

I forgot all about the Libertarian state convention being held in downtown Wilkes-Barre.

But thanks to Tim Mullen, we have been reminded of the fast-approaching event.

Mark,

As a member of the media you are invited to cover the Libertarian state convention and Restoring Freedoms events at the Kirby center next weekend April 20-22. Among the guests attending will be former New Mexico governor and Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson. There will be a Republican US Senatorial debate Saturday evening. There will be a rally then buses from Public Square will be leaving to Ron Paul's Independence Hall event in Philadelphia Sunday morning. I myself will be leaving early Sunday am.with a detail to provide security his event. Here is the link to the event website.

I hope you are doing well and I apologize for not being in touch sooner. The ability of having people support me is very important as I work to make people accountable in Luzerne County Government.

The email that I am writing is to inform you about the recent issue with Len Piazza and his termination so we can be clear on the facts.

The County Controllers Office was conducting an audit of the Human Resources Department in December of 2011 and had selected 50 Departments and 374 County employees to "test" in this audit.

The Auditors started to perform a review of the accruals for Sick and Vacation and Personal time for the Bureau of Elections employees as part of the audit and found that Mr Piazza had over 350 hours of Vacation time and over 500 Hours of Sick time as accruals and the limit for this employee was 230 Hours maximum for Vacation Hours.

The Controllers Office contacted Mr Piazza and the Interim Manager, Tom Pribula, to inform him of the discrepancy and ask for better accountability of this persons time and attendance. Mr Pribula immediately informed Mr Len Piazza that he was required to use the Kronos Time Clock system by punching in and out so that there is accountability to his time, because there were claims by several people in the building, that Mr Piazza was not at his office most of the time during the working day. Mr Tom Pribula even was using the Time Clocks.

The Director of Elections, Mr Piazza, immediately came into his office and went to the County Web page and deactivated the campaign finance page on the County Web Site in retaliation to the Interim County Manager telling him to follow the same procedures as the staff in which he was charged to supervise.

The County Manager started to receive complaints from several taxpayers that were trying to use the County Web site to view Campaign Finance reports, and therefore went to the Director of Elections, Mr Piazza, and told him to reactivate the web site immediately. Mr Piazza refused and was then instructed again to reactivate the web site or he would be terminated. Mr Piazza agreed to place the web site up but didn't activate the entire Campaign Finance Page and left out the 30 Day post election campaign finance reports in order to show his power and insubordination to his boss.

The Director of Elections then proceeded to go to the office and state to the employees that he was going to get even with the Controller of the County for identifying that he was not being accountable for his time because he felt that he was not required to track his time because he was under the direction of the election board.

The Director of Elections then proceeded to draft a letter on official Board of Elections Letterhead complete with the names of the Board and Solicitor on this letter, without the Boards approval and without the Solicitors review, and send it to me as a direct retaliation for my doing the job I was elected to do for the taxpayers of this County. Mr Piazza NEVER CONDUCTED AN AUDIT OF ANY CAMPAIGN FINANCE REPORTS IN all the years in which he was the Director of this office.

The Audit letter was sent to me on a Thursday night via email and then delivered by Fed Ex on Saturday that stated the items that were required from 2007 to present and included requests for Bank Statements and other personal paperwork which he was not authorized to request.

The Audit request was answered by my attorney stating that this request was totally out of line because the Director of Elections has no authority to audit anyone because the State Law only allows the Commonwealth of PA to perform this function and the Director of Elections was violating his duties of his office without authority.

The ability of anyone in government to use their authority to retaliate or intimidate anyone for personal gain is a violation of Federal Law and a persons Civil Rights and also violates the Public trust much like the issue with Judge Conahan and Ciavarella.

The ability of Mr Piazza to do this without authority from the Board of Elections and the Solicitor is total insubordination to his superiors as well and placed the County in a position of being sued by me or someone else for this violation which would have cost the County several thousands of dollars in legal fees.

My campaign finance reports were all submitted on time and in order since I started in the political race for City Council of Wilkes Barre City as well as for County Controller and I have nothing to hide from the office of the Bureau of Elections or the State. The reason for not showing these reports is because he has no authority to audit them and he is simply trying to intimidate and retaliate against me because he is being told he must be accountable for his time and attendance like all other County Employees, even the County Manager punches in and out.

This is the facts as to what happened to Mr Piazza. I never demanded or requested for Mr Piazza to be terminated but simply requested that he be held to the same standards as the other employees in the County that work in an office with the Time Clock System. The County Administration made the decision to terminate Mr Piazza based on the facts.

Please feel free to contact my office at 825-1629 to discuss this matter and to clarify anything that may be unclear regarding this matter.

If you’re not afflicted with one chromosome too many, you know damn well these stories and the crimes that preceded them are drug-related. And I’m thinking we should stop pointing fingers at our elected officials and policing agencies as the scourge that is rampant drug use speeds us down the bumpy road of accelerated societal decay.

Instead, we should attach a permanent stigma to those who partake of illicit and illegal narcotics, no matter the form, no matter the method of delivery or intake and no matter whether said drug use is purported to be recreational or not.

Rather than viewing those who partake of such debilitating substances as chance victims who need our help and who need our increasingly scant resources, perhaps it’s time we see them as what they are…the people who cannot and/or will not control their most basic of impulses.

Rather than continuing on with the failed push to deliver these people to treatment facilities (slap on the wrist), maybe more and more of these obviously reckless people need to be promptly delivered to the hoosegow; an obvious break from the current conventional wisdom.

Look at it this way.

We either deliver harsher sentences and more prisons, or we purchase stronger dead bolts, bigger dogs and more lethal weapons. Because, if we don’t get these losers off of the streets en masse, we are going to become desensitized to home invasions as they become just another disturbing way of life in a country with a rapidly declining quality of life.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Ever since the puzzling murder on Hill Street late last week, I have been bombarded by a steady stream of faux angst, rampant rumor, mindless speculation, specious argument, disparagement borne of impatience and broadsides fired at the mayor, the police department and the police chief of this city.

At this point, the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader should deny it’s readers the chance to comment on it’s news stories, because it’s beyond obvious that anonymity invites the aforementioned friable gibberish as well as provides beer muscles to the cloaked feeble-minded.

We had a local print reporter prematurely attempt to stir up the populace. We had a local radio talk show host try to inject race into the already perplexing circumstances. We had the equivalent of anonymous callers providing useless conjecture. And we had print readers providing inept commentary the likes of which would cause me great embarrassment had my name been attached to them.

Since Friday morning, I’ve heard and read every possible misrepresentation presented as a possible half-truth, every possible misinformation being given as fact and every conceivable city official being given an undeserved electronic tongue-lashing.

Turns out, all we had to do was remain patient, bite our tongues a tad and allow the authorities to thoroughly investigate the matter.

First off, I could really care less about the ongoing religious holiday.

I have no heartwarming thoughts, nor any profundities to offer.

It's been two weeks to the day since my lower back went off on it's freak out session, making it the longest such stretch of uninterrupted pain I have ever experienced. And mind you, the longest such stretch of uninterupted pain I have tried to work through save for the last two work days.

I've employed the Icy/Hot patches, the Icy/Hot cream, good old-fashioned ice, 2 narcotics in the form of pills and my newly-acquired T.E.N.S. unit. And after two tortuous weeks, I am pain-free and ready to rock. 'Bout time.

Anyway, when I was a boy I spurned numerous trips abroad to spend my summers with my beloved grandparents at Harveys Lake, PA. In retrospect, I wouldn't change a thing if I could.

And with the advent of the now-aged Internet, I decided a long time ago that I have absolutely no interest in traveling abroad being that I live in the only country I would ever want to live in.

But, there are exceptions to every rule. So if I were to travel overseas, I could see myself at Princess Juliana International Airport at Sint Maarteen, Netherlands. Further, after a couple of dozen trendy agricultural amusement aides were consumed, I could envision myself desperately clinging to a violently convulsing chain-link fence.

Friday, April 6, 2012

Seems she forgot her lunch one day and was reduced to eating what her students were eating. Horrified, she made it her mission to continue eating what the kids were eating, but she would file reports on the substandard foodstuffs via her blog.

Wilkes-Barre Mayor Tom Leighton released the following statement today:

"My thoughts and prayers are with Tyler Winstead's family today. This is a tragic incident and as a father of three children myself I cannot begin to imagine how to cope with the loss of a life so young. I want to assure the family and the people of Wilkes-Barre that we will exhaust every resource at our disposal to bring the perpetrator of this crime to justice. This is the top priority of the administration and the police department. We will continue to work closely with the Luzerne County District Attorney's Office and Pennsylvania State Police to solve this murder. Anyone with information related to this shooting is asked to call Wilkes-Barre Police at 570-208-4200."

Since the Democrats went and elected some unknown president from Allah only knows where, I figure the rest of us can play the same dangerous game.

Pick a name, any name.

Hope and change will be yours.

I see that our increasingly petulant child king is now telling the Supreme Court--a distinctly separate branch of the Fedrule Govmint--what it ought and ought not do. Always wagging that finger, he is.

Oh, and then he attacked a proposed Republican budget as being “thinly veiled social Darwinism.“

For those of you who graduated from G.A.R. with a forged GED certificate, that means if we scale back King Oblahblah’s record spending levels in an attempt to not bankrupt the country by later on tonight, that’s really bad.

He also went on to say that Republicans are in favor of spoiling our water, our air, our food and our ecotricity (whatever that is).

He is petulant, dogmatic, divisive, incompetent and totally dishonest.

Sez me.

Comment Policy

I encourage readers to post their thoughts here, even if they take me to task. I really do. Have at it. Bring it!

But I’m not going to post comments on a person’s weight and the like. Some of us are thin. Some of us are not. But I’d rather we stick with the issues, or the politics or whatever. Not something that will get some half-wit looking to sue somebody.

We can fight. Personally, I like fighting. One of the few things I was ever truly good at...fighting.

But let’s fight smart, shall we?

From the email inbox:

Only an ASSH*LE like you would make fun of people who are putting together a unique NEPA event that would benefit a local charity. Get over yourself homie.

Au contraire. I did not “make fun” of anyone. I merely stated that I thought this BlogCon thing sounded kind of silly.

In addition, with two BlogFests a year plus the Operatic/Naked Cage Fight Society forays, over saturation comes to mind. Why not once-a-month?

As for the ghetto parlance, it makes me noticeably cringe no matter who uses it. But it sounds really, really, really lame coming from white folks. Especially when coming from so-called ‘adult’ whites.

Sup wit dat?

I thinkGort has been all over this brewing Holden/Cartright primary scrum. But the more I read about these two candidates, the more I find myself thinking…who?

Let’s see, we’ve got the incumbent who lives so far away, he’d probably need to purchase a Leer jet to “serve” us up here in the culm belt.

And then we’ve got this other guy who, who, who…who?

Alas, since the congressional districts were gerrymandered to the point of looking like an aroused octopus fully erect and ready to engage, I figure those back room political peddlers should be punished by having that imported congressman of theirs unceremoniously thrown out of office.

From what I’m reading and seeing, the latest intsallment of BlogFest was a rousing success. Not surprised. But I would have liked to have been there.

The reason I didn’t make it there? Salesman. Salesman see every job they sell as being easy, not labor-intensive or time-consuming. Nope, every job is easy. So, there I was trapped in the Valmont industrial park by yet another easy job.

If I did make it there, I would have posed with that enormous pink pig and posted the picture as being of me and my date, Opal. C'mon, baby. How's about a lil' peck on the cheek?

Just saying.

Unlike in this area, down Allentown way, bloggers are not treated by the local media as if contact with them necessitates ‘side-effects include’ warnings.

Private message to Kayak Dude: (if you are not said person, do not read the following): Dude, how about taking along a caged canary when next we paddle in protest?

I found the following at that Wicki-what-the-funk-pedia depository of all known things. And quite frankly, I am as shocked as I am heartsick.

On Patrick Murphy, candidate for PA state attorney general…

On February 13, 2008 he was the only member of the House to vote against a resolution congratulating the New York Giants for the team's victory in Super Bowl XLII. “As a former 700-level security guard and lifelong Eagles fan, I couldn’t, in good conscience, vote for the New York Giants”, Murphy later stated. “The only thing worse would have been a resolution honoring the Dallas Cowboys."

Yes, kiddies, as a former elected official, he has a record. Or in this case, as it pertains to this voter---a big green albatross.

“If you were a giant, you could be a New York Giant, which would be a very powerful giant indeed.”---Tom Chapin

Then again, I could drink with a guy who loathes those overrated pricks from Dallas, Texas.

Speaking of Patrick Murphy, published rumor has it that he’s interested in purchasing a wide swath of Wilkes-Barre.

And this is exactly why the reputable polibloggers are still kept at arms length by many, because some anonymous, ill-prepared and misguided person still chooses to publish unsubstantiated rumors.

Thanks, dolt. Keep up the piss-poor work.

Gort, make sure this guy isn’t invited to the Operatic/Naked Cage Fight Society function slated for September 21st. Because if he does attend, I might have to agree to be completely disagreeable. And then some.